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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT; 



SONNETS AND SONGS 

FOR 



A HOUSE OF DAYS 



CHRISTIAN BINKLEY 



I gan to this place aproche 
That stood upon so high a roche. 
Hyer stant ther noon in Spayne 







SAN FRANCISCO 
A. M. ROBERTSON 



THE LIBRARY OF 
CONGRESS, 

Two CoptEa Receiveo 

m, H 1902 

Copyright entry 

(K |»^v . £f - i ci o i~ 
C»,ASS cuXXo. No. 

COPY B. 









Copyright 1902 
By C. K. Binkley 



500 COPIES PRINTED FROM TYPE APRIL 28, 1902 
BY THE THADDEUS BARR PRINTING CO. 



TO THOSE 
WHO HAVE LINGERED WITH ME 

FOR A WHHyE 
AT THE CROSSING OF OUR WAYS 



Digitized by the Internet Archive 
in 2011 with funding from 
The Library of Congress 



http://www.archive.org/details/sonnetssongsforhOObink 



TO THE OLD FRIENDS 

do you remember, when our lives were young, 

how the winds and the waters, the sun and the rain 
Were filled with a mystery almost pain? 
how the days strove to speak but could find no tongue, 
And welled in our hearts instead, and sung? 

Do you remember? Do the windy hollows 

Still set the soul to their melody? 

Deep in your dreams do you not see 
The sunlight and the wheeling swallows, 
The clouds above and the shade that follows? 

do you remember? the years are long, 

And men must seek for what is not. 

They may well forget — have you forgot? — 
The light and the mist and the wonderful song 
With its far-off burden sweet and strong. 

Sister, we saw the stars appear; 

Aye, and we counted them one by one. 

To-night I watched as we had done; 
But ah, the magic and the fear 
Of the stars is gone this many a year. 

Sister and friends, — we who have wet 

Our childhood feet in the meadow brook, 

And we who have read from the selfsame book, 

And whoever has paused where our paths have met,— 

Let us remember. Can we forget? 



CONTENTS 

IN DISTANT FIELDS (Sonnets) 

"Then I,ife was golden at the verge" 3 

"A boy I heard the distant bells" 3 

The West Wind 5 

Looking Eastward . 6 

The Mowing 7 

The Farmhouse 8 

The Turnpike 9 

In Early Spring io 

The Lyceum n 

A Rainy Day 12 

A Harvest Evening 13 

ENCHANTED GROUND {Sonnets) 

"Flamboyant wave the wings of Fate" 17 

Whither? 19 

Remembered Shade . . , , 20 

Kismet , 21 

En Passant 22 

Recompense 23 

My Love is Limned in Light . . 24 

Love's Silence 25 

Love's Fulness . . . , 26 

October 27 

The Vision .' 28 

Into the Future 29 

From the Heights , . 30 

Reply 31 

The Three Angels 32-3 

PEBBLES WET WITH THE SEA (Sonnets) 

"How lazily the little bark" 37 

"Out of a land of dreams he came" 37 

Pebble Beach 39 

Suggestion 40 

Pan 41-2 



Merlin 43 

Don Quixote de la Mancha 44 

The Fringed Gentians 45 

The Dead 46 

Genius 47 

History 48 

ORPHICA (Sonnets) 

"They rose from dreams of battles fought" .... 51 

The Awakening 53 

From the Deeps 

"I stand as one at midnight and and alone" .... 54 

"Out on the bosom of the boundless Deep" ... 55 

"Far from the suns and tempests of the day" ... 56 

"And sometimes when the noisy winds are stayed" . . 57 

"But be there sun or starlight, calm or storm" ... 58 

Aftertones 59 

Ultimates 60 

THE HEART OF DAY (Sonnets) 

"He walked the way of smiles and tears" .... 63 

Dawn and Sunrise 65 

The Age of Iron 66 

The Cry 67 

With Hearts not Resonant 68 

To H. B. G 69 

As Dreams Forever 70 

To J. H. S., M. D 71 

The Need 72 

To H. M. E 73 

Poets We Call Ourselves 74 

A Poet? You a Poet? 75 

'Per Li Cui Preghi" 76 

PICTURES AND DREAMS (Sonnets) 

"The deed with life is dripping wet" 79 

The Sonnet 81 

A Sonnet Wouldst Thou Build 82 

Theocritus 83 



Cupid and Psyche 84 

Bartolome Ruiz 85 

Aucassin and Nicolete 86 

Mors Velata 87 

The Singer 88 

Arthur and Guinevere 89 

Rosalind 90 

Amor Tristis 91 

Tbe Inept • _. 92 

One Sin There Is 93 

The Fruit Girl 94 

Evening 95 

Tristan and Isolt 

I. The Potion 96 

II. The Sails 97 

Seattle 98 

The Dramas of Shakespeare 99 

BY THE FIRESIDE 

The Wind Song 103 

To a Child 104 

Felicitas . 105 

Mother-Love 106 

A Voyager 107 

What the Chick Said 108 

Songs of a Shoe 109 

STOPS OF VARIOUS QUILLS 

"Not on land and not on sea" 113 

Years and Change 115 

The Neophyte 116 

October 117 

The Parting 11S 

Phyllis 119 

To a Housewife 120 

The Wedding Gown 121 

Maiden Fancies 

In the Hammock 122 



Waiting 123 

Heart of the Rose 124 

Through the Years 125 

Medea 126 

World-Weary 127 

The Closed Gentian 129 

Alone 131 

A Last Word 132 

The Song 133 

Far, Far Away 134 

A Girl 135 

The Poet of the Doves 141 

Baron Stiegel 144 

Fate and Over-Fate 149 

Whence? Whither? 151 

VALUES 
Valubs 

I. "Would you hold in your hand" 155 

II. "Better than the sharpened sense" .... 155 

III. "There came to him a radiant Dream" . . . .155 

V. "The form and substance strangely join" . . . 156 

VI. "He thought to build his life and planned" . . 157 

VII. "Life it floweth like a stream" 158 

From the Hilltop 159 

A Dirge 160 

To Omar Khayyam . 161 

The Castle of Autrememe 172 

Notes 177 



SONNETS 



IN DISTANT FIELDS 



Then life was golden at the verge 
And filled with vast world-murmurings, 
With glimpses like the sheen of wings, 
Deep visions of a demi-urge; 
But all the nearer view was dim 
And other than its use to him. 



A boy I heard the distant bells, 
But straight the sound forgot; 
The sunset slanted o'er the dells,— 

I heeded not. 
Now, far away, where'er I go 
I see those wondrous sunsets glow. 
And faintly heard but ceaselessly 
The bells of boyhood ring to me. 



THE WEST WIND 

PALO ALTO, CALIFORNIA 

THE pale-green poplars shimmer in the sun, 
And wave and rustle ; the dry grasses sway ; 
The oaks and eucalyptus far away 
Take up a moaning music one by one. 

Here from the shadows mark the tremor run 
Over the hillside to the mountains gray: 
Dim gray and purple, moveless, only they 
Are silent in the west-wind's carillon. 

This is the bearer of all mysteries, 

Whose fleet-winged cohorts are the messengers 

Bringing o'er unseen mountains the dim roar 

And surge and glitter of what magic seas 
With dream-spray dashing and bright islanders 
And harps and sounding timbrels on the shore. 



LOOKING EASTWARD 

SACRAMENTO VALLEY 

THE great sun pours his gold athwart the plain,— 
Over the waving grasses smit with light, 
O'er knee-deep cattle, o'er the nearer hight 
With summit tremulous in the golden rain. 

Late afternoon ! Already many a lane 
Of shadow marks the sunlit mountain-side, 
And distant peaks in hazy violet dyed 
Show the long summer day upon the wane. 

But there are unseen mountains farther still 

Of deeper violet jutting to the skies, 

And plains with twilight noises faint and far; 

And far ah, far beyond a valley lies 
Dreaming in darkness, while above the hill 
Trembles the glory of the evening star. 



THE MOWING 

FRAGRANCE of flowers and new-mown meadow hay 
Sun-tipped, in swathes tumultuous as seas, 
And odors, guessed at, of red strawberries, 
Blend with the silver radiance of the day. 

The clamorous noise of mowing dies away, 
Then comes again upon the shifting breeze 
To where a boy under the apple trees 
Lies deep in tumbled grasses, weary of play. 

Before him gleams the far-off city, white 
As if transfigured, with a halo on; 
Beyond are mountains vague and mystical. 

The city and the mountains lure with might: 
One fore-glimpse of the world and that is all 
Again the clatter, and the dream is gone. 



THE FARMHOUSE 

A WIDE veranda, cool, with lisp of leaves, 
Fragrant with clambering roses! See, there whirrs 
That feathered rainbow to the nest of hers 
Hid in the clematis vines under the eaves. 

Faint from a meadow near, a brooklet grieves, 
Silver in emerald, and naught else stirs 
Save that, beyond, the bending harvesters 
Follow and bind in rows and toss the sheaves. 

We enter: through bowed shutters sunbeams fall 
Sparsely, and all is shadowy in gloom ; — 
Dimly beyond there widens hall on hall. 

We hear the minutes ticking slowly where 
A white-capped woman knitting in her chair 
Rocks in the golden silence of the room. 



THE TURNPIKE 

THREE furlong lengths of dazzling white; no breeze; 
White dust in wreaths from traffic to and fro. 
There crunching, creaking, laden wagons go; 
There hoofs keep rhythmic time on echoing keys; 

And there a wheelman threads his way with ease, 
Silent and swift; a herd of cattle, slow, 
Dense-packed, with nostrils red and heads hung low 
Skirt the sparse shadows of the locust trees. 

Thus hour by hour the varied retinue 
Traverse the sunlit space then pass from view 
Down the long hill-slopes into lands unknown ; 

And sometimes when the day is nearly done 
The echo from a bridge far off is blown 
In long low rumblings crossing one by one. 



IN EARLY SPRING 

UNDER the blossoms of the birchwood trees 
To the last arbutus beneath the pine! 
Then in the sunlight where star-grasses shine, 
Seek out the violets upon your knees. 

Down for the white bloodroot! Now storm with ease 
The rocky castle of the columbine : 
Plunder and pillage ! sip the honey-wine, 
Then to the uplands for anemones! 

Thus up the moist slope newly carpeted, 

Ruthless and glad as nature, lungs stretched wide! 

But on the knoll upon the bird-foot bed, 

Counting our gathered riches we abide, 

And through green vistas see the country side 

Sloping in sunlight to the mountain's head. 



the: LYCEUM 

jr~[HIS evening: the first large stars look down 

X. On fields where all the golden afternoon 
Above the huskers hung a pallid moon, — 
It tints with silver now the somber brown. 

From shadowy meadow farms long-laned, and town 
Nestled in quiet shade they come, and soon 
They gather, conscious school-boys, men rough hewn 
In brawn and brain, with lover, lass and clown. 

Then in the dim-lit school room breathe again 
In ampler space the glorious deeds of men; 
New Tullys open wide the golden bars: 

Breathless we listen from the glowing hights; 
And homeward, looking up, we see the lights 
Of the great city blended with the stars. 



A RAINY DAY 

OVER the wide, half-emptied lofts of grain, 
The dusty rafters where the brown bats cling, 
And gloomy beams with swallows twittering, 
Sounds the dull thrumming of the ceaseless rain. 

The wind's low moaning grows, then sinks again ; 
The brook's far rush is stilled to murmuring; 
Wet branches sweep the roof with measured swing ; 
And, harshly creaking, shifts the weather-vane. 

The pigeons overhead, with irised blue 
Dim in the faded light, flutter and coo 
Where the great girder o'er the mow is hung. 

Below, half hid in odorous meadow hay, 
There lies a boy adream, hearing that day 
Echoes of songs that never shall be sung. 



A HARVEST EVENING 

THE west is glowing redder than a rose; 
The swallows wheel and wheel. Down the long lane, 
Swaying and creaking with its weight of grain 
The wagon laden with the harvest goes. 

Fainter the sound of wheels and tramping grows; 

The cedar gloom surrounds them ; like a door 

It closes; all is still .... On oaken floor 

A tramp of hoofs .... Silence . . The west still glows 

The cattle leave the barn and slowly pass 
Through the wide bars into the meadow grass; 
Upon the crimson of the pool beyond, 

Their shadows fall. The boy puts up the bars, 
Then stands upon the border of the pond ; 
And lo, the glitter of the first faint stars. 



13 



SONNETS 



ENCHANTED GROUND 



Flamboyant wave the wings of Fate 
And all of life bursts into sound; 

The floweret by the garden gate 

Would grow to music, — will not wait; 

But men are inarticulate, 
And far beyond the utmost bound 

Of sight and sense the world goes round. 



WHITHER? 

WHITHER, ah, whither blows the restless wind 
Swaying the poplars as it passes by, 
Blowing the one lone bird across the sky, 
Leaving the one lone changing cloud behind? 

This is the bard with fingers unconfined 
Sweeps into concord scarce heard murmurings, — 
For whom the Soul unweaves from tense harp-strings 
The withered weeds and grasses o'er them twined. 

The earliest dreams whereon the fancy fed, 
Visions of beauty that the footsteps led, 
Hopes, Fears, and Love — Love flowing garmented, 
Noiseless, with hair unbound and backward blown, 
And roses falling — long (ah whither?) fled, 
Come trembling to the Harper's hollow tone. 



J 9 



REMEMBERED SHADE 

AS ONE that from the dust and glare at noon 
Enters a pathway dark with fragrant bowers, 
Where drooping branches are and shrubs and flowers 
And vines voluptuous in long festoon, 

And there, with birds and water-songs in tune, 
Twining the maiden-hair and violets, 
The weary way before him quite forgets 
Until he sees the glare again — too soon; 

So I, in my high noon of life, have staid 
In pleasant paths of love an hour or two, 
Forgetting all and seeing all anew 
And hearkening all music that was made, — 
But now the long bare highway I pursue 
With nought to cheer me but remembered shade. 



KISMET 

A DREAMY tread of passers to and fro; 
A sound of nurse-girls' idle gossiping; 
The sun and shadows where the children swing; 
The naiads veiled by silver overflow, 

With grim chimeras sputtering below 
Where full bowls drip and sparrows preen the wing;- 
All these, upon the rude bench loitering, 
He saw and heard as figures in a show. 

But, lost in self, he neither saw nor heard 
Her whom the years had held for him alone, — 
She lingered but a moment, then was gone; 

And when the waters fell in fuller tone 
And roses bent, his heart was strangely stirred, 
He wondered why, forgot, and plodded on. 



EN PASSANT 

A DOWN the dusty road at close of day 
The wheelman glides alone: the shadows fall 
With somber lines athwart the path, and tall 
And grim pursue him slowly down the way. 

Before him, outlined in the fading ray 
And glorified, beside the broken wall 
There stands a maid, who lures with silver call 
The cattle home and bides their long delay. 

They, lowing, nipping one last blossom, go 
From out the dusky shadows up the lane; 
Again the maiden calls, again they low. 

She turns and sees the stranger gliding by ; 
He sees the dreamlight in her tender eye — 
Is gone — and twilight deepens o'er the plain. 



RECOMPENSE 

IWIhL, not know her nearer lest I lose 
A long sweet dream of light and innocence : 
I/est from the vision fade its magic hues 
Or all the world be won at Soul's expense. 

Against the real I will make defense; 
Be wary of the toils where none may choose, 
Of tresses that entangle him who views, 
And dark eyes thralling with mute eloquence. 

Once on my lonely path there was a gleam 
That dimmed not in the light of common day ; 
Now in my heart of hearts I have a dream 
To lift my life and beckon on for aye, 
For be the image gold or common clay 
To BE has not been other than To SEEM. 



23 



MY LOVE IS LIMNED IN LIGHT 

I KNOW not how — my Love is limned in light; 
Where'er she walks a thousand presences 
Unseen surround her, bending on their knees 
And Holy, Holy! singing, stoled in white. 

Or hovering in numbers infinite, 
With censers swinging to their litanies, 
And sheen of slanted wings for witnesses, 
They half conceal my Love from mortal sight. 

Once, only once, and ended all too soon — 
Unguarded were the windows of her eyes — 
The woman soul looked out in glad surprise; 
But when she drooped the lashes dark and long, 
Lo, all the waiting ages sprang to song 
And all my life vibrated into tune. 



24 



LOVE'S SILENCE 

WHAT mood is this that marries only eyes, 
That freezes all the soul's sweet turbulence 
To silence or the silent-cold pretense 
Hidden in Form. Deep are the midnight skies, 

Mellowed in light below the valley lies . . . 
Now she is present unrevealed to sense; 
The night is voluble with eloquence 
I/ong pent, and music of her low replies. 

Thus on a starry midnight long ago 
With the full moon upon the sapphire seas 
Tipping with silver light the orchard trees, 

A maiden in her passion pure as snow, 
Rose-rich, and full as complete harmonies 
Made music with the name of Romeo. 



25 



LOVE'S FULNESS 

THERE are three moments in the life of man 
That cast a radiance on all his seeing. 
One is the child-glimpse to the depth of Being: 
It makes him Nature's cosmopolitan ; 

One yields him larger insight in the plan 
Of the world, — the Vision Beautiful of youth 
Caught in a maiden's glance, that halos Truth 
Fairer than painter or than poet can. 

The third is when a soul imperial 
Unwraps its folds of form, steps from its throne, 
Like the First Mother cleaves to him alone. 
This is Love's fulness, holy, mystical: 
The melody of life takes overtone 
Making one music till the shadows fall. 



26 



OCTOBER 

WHEN we are old ! the summer, Love, is sped, 
The leaves are gold, the birds have flown away ; 
Will love, too, leave us when the hair is gray? 
Will life still linger when the heart is dead ? 

Look, Love, the skies and river now are red ! 
Look in my eyes, Love, look, are they not blue? 
The daylight dies, Love — will our love die too 
When youth is ended and the years are fled ? 

Dear Heart of mine, no season, no regrets, 
No change can be: Love sets no transient snare 
Hid in the light upon a woman's hair, 
Rustle of silks, or scent of violets; 
If he once enter he is ever there 
Though pulse grow feeble and the brain forgets. 



27 



THE VISION 

METH OUGHT, dear Love, I stood upon a shore, 
A pleasant shore ; white clouds went floating by 
Tracing dark shadows, and the sea-birds high 
Circled and wide. The ocean's solemn roar 
Blended with all: its rolling bosom bore 
White winged barks that bounded gallantly- 
Over its blue to dim uncertainty. 

Beyond the breakers hoarse, their heads full hoar, 
Beyond the snowy sails, beyond the skies 
I gazed, and dreamed — of what I can not tell, 
When a soft hand was laid in mine, brown eyes 
Looked into mine with love ineffable. 
The lips half parted were, to speak; it seemed 
I stooped and kissed them, Love. All this I dreamed. 



28 



INTO THK FUTURE 

OLOVE, dear Dove, come lay thy hand in mine 
And bid me deep to read those peerless eyes, 
Telling their richest lore with no surmise, 
Drinking their lessons as men drink rare wine. 

Is this the book wherein on every line 
Is writ one word in ways that still surprise 
With pictures new? .... But see, a shadow lies, 
Deep, trembling, which I cannot all divine. 

I read it now, dear Love; you dimly see 
The visions of the larger life unfold ; 
Now quivering for the new world, now you shrink 

Back to the old. O, dare to leave the brink, 
And fear not, for whate'er the future hold 
Our love will keep us happy, young, and free. 



29 



FROM THE HEIGHTS 

WHY linger, Love, within trie vale below 
Amid the dews and damps? The view is wide, 
Upon the lofty Peak, and I shall guide 
To regions of delight none else may know. 

Green is the valley, pleasant in its flow 
The river with the rushes at its side, 
The meadows with their violets blue and pied, 
And shadows that forever come and go. 

But fairer are the heights that we shall tread, 
Brighter the sunset splendors that uprear 
Their minarets of gold, the stars outspread 

Lordly at night. Then tremble not, nor fear 
O Love, to come: its beauty will be fled 
And all the joy be pain save thou be hear. 



30 



REPLY 

FARBWELIv, farewell! I cannot see the way; 
I faint for weariness and lose my hold. 
The view is wide, but ah, the peaks are cold, 
And now with mists the world beneath is gray. 

And — was it but a dream ? — I thought Ja ray 
Pierced the cloud-wrappings, touched their sides with gold, 
And, falling on the valley and the wold, 
kit up the fields where happy children play. 

Can it be sin and weakness that I sigh — 
Deeming that even lowly things have worth — 
For hands that reach, and eyes that look in mine. 

I know I am not worthy to be thine ; 
I would not tempt thee down to things of earth, 
And yet, O Love, be near me or I die. 



31 



THE THREE ANGELS 



AN ANGEL entered at the minster door 
When all within was newly garnished; 
The ruddy flame lambent about the head 
And glowing vesture echoed a far roar 
From nave and choir and dim aisles vaulted o'er, 
As from tall forests in the gold and red 
Of a vast sunset. . . . Silently he sped, 
And save for echoes all was as before. 

Another entered, and the minster grew 
To holy silence, for the face was veiled. 
It seemed the virgin's pictured lips were paled 
Where the dead Christ down from the cross was laid: 
A golden incense hid the dome from view; 
Men built a shrine, and there the angel staid 



32 



II 

ANOTHER came upon a holy-day: 
A silver star above the aureole 
Threw singing light ; about the snow-white stole 
And the white rose that on the bosom lay 
Were sound and sunlight in sweet interplay. 
They lit. the pillared nave ; the organ's roll 
Sank into soft clear notes as when a soul 
Not long redeemed mid splendors kneels to pray. 

The clouded incense, scattered by the light, 
Fell from the shining dome in silver rain ; 
The emblazoned saints beamed glorious again, 
And the sad angel's veil faded from sight 
Leaving the crystal tears: gone was the pain, 
And at one shrine the angels knelt till night. 



33 



SONNKTS 



PEBBI^S WKT WITH THE SKA 



How lazily the little bark 

Is rocking on the deep ! 
But fathoms down in caverns dark 

The ocean Dangers sleep. 



Out of a land of dreams he came 
By a high gate that bears no name, 
Nor, blinded, could he rightly see 
If it be horn or ivory. 



PEBBLE BEACH 

PESCADERO, CALIFORNIA 

GLITTER of onyx, beryl, chrysoprase, 
Opal and pearl, for here all gems that are 
Treasured in hoard of emperor or czar, 
Heaped in the sunlight lie beneath our gaze. 

The lonely sail fades on the watery ways ; 
The huge, white-crested billows rear afar 
And break in thunder on the rocky bar: 
We mark alone the pebbles' diverse rays. 

Our whole lives long we play upon a strand; 
Stooping to choose out gaud or glittering gem 
For place in coffer or on diadem. 

The surges rise and fall: heedless we stand 
Dazed by the glamour of the shimmering sand 
And pebbles wet with the sea that rounded them. 



39 



SUGGESTION 

ALL DAY the breakers thunder, and their roar 
Strives, but in vain, to reach the soul within; 
Unheeded on the portal falls the din 
Of surges at their elemental war. 

Inland upon a crag that beetles o'er 
The world below, seeming as it had been 
A seat for guardian gods, I wait to win 
The secret altar, but I find no door. 

But in the night-time, when the silence draws 
Priestlike the heart's confessions, while we speak 
Of home or friends, a little word, a key 
Forgotten now, unlocks the mystery: 
The curtains of the future are as gauze ; 
The hills of life are lit from base to peak. 



40 



PAN 

UPON the outer precincts of a wood 
I wandered mourning "Pan is dead; 
Here lies his pine-wreath sere and red, 
His broken pipe wherein he poured his mood.' 
But in the leafy inner depths ,1 stood 
Silent, and a tremor ran: 
"The great god Pan, the great god Pan!" 
From ferny rock and tree o'er many a rood. 

I peered, and there hidden in deepest shade 
Beneath a rock with ivies was the god. . . . 
A silver trickling moistened all the sod. . . . 
I saw the goat foot and the shaggy thighs, 
The curling beard, the graveness in his eyes. 
I gazed ; he took his hollow pipe and played 



41 



Pan "Pale Hecate has cooled her black-blood pyres 
And Cytherea's temple stones are mold; 
But now as in the buoyant age of gold 
On inner shrines she builds her altar fires. 
"To human hearts remain the same desires, 
The Child is clothed in fashions manifold ; 
Dodona's oaks still rustle as of old, 
Apollo strikes his chords on other -wires." 

In every age the Poet gives a tongue 

Of music to the jarring multitude, 

For if he greatly strike in any mood 

The sounding human harp forever young, 

It vibrates now as when the golden brood 

Of Saturn ruled and broad-browed Homer sung. 



42 



MERIJN 

"INE times her wimple round the bush she drew, 
Nine times repeated the unhallowed spell 
The mage himself had taught her all too well, 
Then left him sleeping there who dimly knew. 

The sinking sun long shadows o'er him threw, 
The white thorn blossoms faded where they fell, 
The grasses round his hoary temples grew, 
And at their roots the field-mouse built her cell. 

Summer and winter there in slumberous ease, 
Mute save for one word whispered, "Vivien," 
Far hidden in the shadowed vale he seems; 

But who can say what vast world-harmonies 
Vibrating broken in the deeds of men 
Ring where he lies deep sunken in his dreams. 



43 



DON QUIXOTE DE LA MANCHA 

WHO sees the world aright and who awry? 
Basin or helmet? Aye, or whole cuirasses, 
Similia similibus. Time passes, 
And, brother, ere a hundred years roll by, 
Pray what's the odds if you it was or I 
That saw the true Dulcinea? Country lasses, 
Broad-faced, bare-armed, with panniers and asses, 
Or palf reyed princess ? — who shall testify ? 
Redoubted knight of company numerous ! 
Milton is of it, — Csesar, Dewey, Dante, — 
Each man and age on special Rosinante. 
Now and again we hear our neighbor's neighing, 
And we, stilling our own's sonorous braying, 
Follow adream with dukedoms marvelous. 



44 



the: fringed gentians 

TO J. H S., M. D. 

THERE on the border of the little wood, 
Under the glamour of the bending skies, 
Regal in robe and fringe of Tyrian dyes, 
Glad to the quivering leaf and stem they stood. 

This moment, friend, I sat in pensive mood 
And knew again with you the glad surprise, 
Gazing upon the marvelous show with eyes 
Wide open at the conscious multitude. 

Whose is the title to the paltry field? 
We take, nor leave him poorer than we found : 
His be the toil, the care. Though lawyer's fee, 
Nor tax, nor tithes, nor sordid rents we yield, 
This boundless acre of enchanted ground 
Is yours and mine in perpetuity. 



45 



THE DEAD 

I WALKED the garden of my years gone by, 
'Twas midnight and the heavens were wondrous fair; 
I lingered where the lilies here and there 
Bent dim beneath the vastness of the sky. 

Roses, although I saw them not, were nigh 
And lent their fragrance to the healing air, 
But with me and around me everywhere 
There were the dead, the dead that cannot die. 

I knew them in the breathing hush of trees, 
Their voices in the starry silences, 
And then I saw how in our human lot 

They mingle, entering by hidden ways, 
Guests in this banquet house of nights and days, 
Supping and rising, and we know it not. 



46 



GENIUS 

OUT of the misty years was heard a call, 
Deep unto deep, and now the winds are stayed: 
"Lo, it is I, O Soul, be not afraid!" — 
And then the words were low and musical; 
The mists and darkness lifted like a pall, 
And there was light. He heard the music made 
And saw, upon the flood of Being laid, 
All things in rhythm to its rise and fall. 

Closely he holds the secret of the years, 
His lips are sealed like theirs that have not heard ; 
Bat now and then he speaks a random word, 
And men that hearken thrill with hopes and fears, — 
Or sings a note, short, broken, like a bird, 
And the vast overtones the spirit hears. 



47 



HISTORY 

STRANGE shouts with vast world-echoes in the morn, 
White towers and temples in forgotten reigns, 
Forgotten wars upon the windy plains 
Reverberated to the days unborn ! 

With blood-stained steps her altar stairs are worn: 
Myriads of feet have worn away the stains; 
Man's Sempiternum in a thousand fanes 
Reared upon ruin she has laughed to scorn. 

Slowly men weave the fabric strand by strand, 
Costly, in colors Tyrian dyed and gold ; 
Blindly they grope, but guided by a Hand. 

Slowly the Sibyl leafs her blotted book: 
Beyond her hand she will not let us look, 
But blasts his sight who reads it over-bold. 



48 



SONNETS 



ORPHICA 



They rose from dreams of battles fought 
And stormed the frowning battlements, 
And in the twilight pitched their tents 

Upon the farthest plains of thought. 



THE AWAKENING 

I SEE the mystery of life anew, 
Bright angels have passed by me: I have heard 
A whirr of wings, and voices in adieu. 
Now all that seems is hushed, scarcely are stirred 
The curtains of the soul, and all things seem 
Brooding, and big with portents like the night. 
But now I thought I saw the distant gleam 
Of angel pinions in the western light, 
And heard the fading music: then it rolled 
In floods of living sound ; and as they swept 
Around, in whispered awe they spoke and told 
The secrets of the universe. I kept 
The fragments that I heard: now all things are 
Lit with a glory not of sun or star. 



53 



FROM THE DEEPS 

I STAND as one at midnight and alone, 
Musing, before the wide inscrutable sea: 
He hears the sullen breakers' distant moan 
And sees the billows rolling restlessly; 
He sees the white foam gleam unweariedly 
And hears the far-off ocean Voices groan; 
And mingling in a subtile overtone, 
The shattered moonlight weaves in mystery. 
It is not sea that moans, not sea but soul, 
His own ; the tides are pulse-beats and the roar 
Is music of his own; the weird sea knoll 
Falls from the deeps of life; and evermore 
He stands alone and hears the untiring roll 
Of restless tides upon the sounding shore. 



54 



Out on the bosom of the boundless Deep From the 

There heaves a curbless billow; on its breast " 

The long cold star-streams like an unloved guest 

Dinger alone and silent vigil keep. 

A million sparkling droplets lightly leap 

White in the broken star-shine of the crest, 

Then to the tideless gloom they sink to rest 

In long tranquillity of endless sleep. 

A drop of these am I, the world the wave, 

Nature the boundless Deep. Thence did I flow, 

Thence, and in silence, I shall sink anon 

With all that was and is. This is the grave 

Wide with mysterious will, where all shall go, 

But though the drop shall sink the wave rolls on. 



55 



From the Far from the suns and tempests of the day, 
ee P s par from the stars and tempests of the night, 

Down to the tideless shadows where the light 
Faints wearied, it shall find its lonely way. 
Bright on the surface will the sunlight stay 
Warming the sea-bird's breast, the sky be blue, 
The -new- ocean sound its dirges ever, YU-vt-r^" 
The moonbeams quiver and the starlight play. 
But there, unruffled by the shocks of sense, 
The soul, deep sunken in the Soul of All, 
Yields to a silent, subtler influence, 
And, thrilling to each drop of flashing spray, 
Vibrating to the billows' rise and fall, 
Feels the far life in every creek and bay. 



56 



And sometimes when the noisy winds are stayed, From the 

When the rude shock of waves has died away * 

And all is silent round the couch of Day, 

As if the Master of the Music laid 

A hand upon all harsher notes and played 

In hushed and faintly throbbing undertone, 

I/eaving rich silence when the soul has flown, 

When all is o'er and the last prayer is said, — 

Then are there tremors not of wind or tide, 

Vibrations not of sunlight or of star: 

Bach drop upon the moving breast asleep, 

Feels the pulsation of the mighty Deep, 

Hears it as faint soul-music from afar; 

And holy calm pervades the waters wide. 



57 



From the But be there sun or starlight, calm or storm, 



Deeps 



The drop is ever subject to the sea, 

Mirrors its moods and blue immensity, 

Cold with its cold, and with its warmth is warm. 

In men the formless Nature puts on form, 

Hence judgment wisely prates of ME and THEE, 

And impotently struggling to be free 

Would stem the ocean with a puny arm. 

The tide of time sweeps on, we with the tide, 

And still the breakers thunder on the shore: 

Will we or nill we, with the sea we ride, 

Till deafened by the immeasurable roar 

We heed not the long Impulse in our pride, 

And heeding not believe we hear no more. 



58 



AFTERTONES 

THE morning crimsons long have turned to gray, 
And the deep harmonies ceased one by one; 
Still there is glitter in the noonday sun 
And lesser notes, not unmelodious, sway. 
Now I have seen and heard ; I go my way 
Happy in something ended or begun, 
Rejoicing as each web of will is spun, 
Glad for the warmth and light of common day. 
And still the doors are wide — there are no keys ; 
I hearken at my tasks and hear afar 
The roaring of the multitudinous seas 
And see the glitter where the breakers are ; 
Then round my life there rain sweet melodies 
And shines a glory not of sun or star. 



59 



ULTIMATES 

f'rTlHE highest truth is very near the sod, 

JL "It is not far from beauty up to heaven; 
"The soul with open eye can look on God, 
' 'The folds that wrap the spirit are not seven ; 
"A little child is always in the light, 
"But men are blinded by the strenuous will; 
"The yea and nay can never lead aright, 
"Nor judgment taste the Hippocrenean rill; 
"But labor is the God's creative seal, 
' 'And knowledge is the lesser harmony ; 
"The humblest task the Vision will reveal 
"If men will only open eyes to see:" 
These are the truths in every time and tongue 
To every tune by seer and poet sung. 



60 



SONNETS 



THE HEART OF DAY 



He walked the way of smiles and tears 
Through shadows dark and meadows green; 
But, come from music of the spheres, 
Heard not the broken notes therein. 
When lo, the harmonies unheard, 
He woke to sound of bee and bird, 
And found the golden strain again 
Along the various ways of men. 



DAWN AND SUNRISE 

SANTA CLARA VALLEY 

THE oaks and rose-encumbered gables loom 
Out of the indistinguishable gray, 
And from a hundred farm-yards far away 
And slumberous, the sounds of morning come. 

The birds upon the branches still are dumb. 
But see ! the sinuous lines of mist that lay 
Hiding the deep ravines melt into day, 
And o'er the mountains to a rose in bloom 

Opens the East. Its gold and crimson spills 
On turquoise seas. Lighting the western hills, 
Marking in shade the oaks with dew impearled, 
The rising cattle, and each stem of wheat, 
The long slant sunbeam strikes athwart the world; 
And the great heart of day begins to beat. 



65 



THE AGE OF IRON 

TO H. M. E. 

WHAT men are these? They would be buying, selling; 
They deem the good they touch the only good. 
They rear their fanes, cement with sweat and blood 
The lofty frames wherein no God has dwelling. 

The waters of the Spirit would be welling ; 
They freeze them into forms of stone and wood, 
And who the sacrilege rebukes, with rude 
Unholy hands they scourge for his rebelling. 

Is it not pity that there should be need 
For a high soul to leave its heritage 
To gain the means to use it? — yea, should give 
Itself the hardened mint-marks of the age, 
And jingle on a till, in very deed 
Selling its life to buy the means to live? 



66 



THE CRY 

WITH men I mingled on the thoroughfare 
In the hard strife, beheld the painted lie 
Of Custom, yea, and saw Sin branded bare 
Upon the shameless brow of Harlotry. 

And I have seen the dull and patient eye, — 
Seeking it knew not what, it knew not where, — 
Till in my brain the mockery and despair 
Blent in an awful, inarticulate cry : 

"Bread! give us bread, that we may faint no more. 
Life ! give us life, the life we do not know, 
Wide as the winds are, as the heavens free, 
Else, spite of gold, your land shall sink in woe, 
And red-mouthed Rapine range until the sea 
Shall lapse a requiem on a desolate shore." 



67 



WITH HEARTS NOT RESONANT 

WITH sins of baser sort whereof there breed, 
Dimming the light a God must reillume, 
Rank vapors sucked by such as walk the gloom ; 

With tears and foul contagions that they feed: 
Men turned to beasts by riot, lust, and greed, 
Women dethroned, and the vast hecatomb 
Of infants thwarted from the mother's womb, 
This earth of ours is made a hell indeed. 

And we, men in full light inert and dull, 
Doing nor wrong nor right, and therefore wrong, 
Meting in formal wise soul-measure scant, 

We, when the vials of God's wrath are full, 
Shall hear: "Not these; 'twas ye that marred my Song, 
Your fair green world, with hearts not resonant. 



68 



TO H. B. G. 

AUGUST 15, 1899 

TO-DAY, friend, let us turn the page, and glance 
Back o'er those glad few days by Ayr and Doon 
When we, too little thankful for the boon, 
Thridded the windings mellowed by romance. 

Each flower we plucked had in its countenance, 
Each consecrated streamlet in its tune, 
Something of that sweet Singer gone too soon, 
And that high heart at war with circumstance. 

We too have struggled and we have not bent, 
Not paid lip-worship that our hearts belie, 
But life is long and sterner grows the way. 

God grant the soul-wealth may not all be spent 
Nor wholly dimmed the dreamlight in the eye 
When next we meet, though furrowed deep and gray. 



69 



AS DREAMS FOREVER 

TO ANNA 

SISTER, I know I cannot feel the pain 
Of one beside an open grave, who hears 
The first earth close o'er hopes of wedded years, — 
Nor the long after yearning, deep, but vain. 

I have been richly blest; sorrows have lain 
Lightly upon us; all our life's dim fears 
Seem blossoming to blessings, and our tears 
Are rainbow tintings after others' rain. 

But once in dreams I saw my children lie, — 
One sunny haired with visions all too wide, 
One with the luscious South in heart and eye. 

I kissed them, but they both were still — like yours. 
" 'Tis well," I said, "for now they will abide 
As dreams forever, and a dream endures." 



70 



TO J. H. S., M. D. 

FRIEND, you have chosen out the better way. 
Priests in the fane of Poesy, our hymns 
We chant at midnight till the soul-lamp dims 
And altar-piece and paintings fade to gray. 

You do your deeds of healing day by day ; 
We have seen Visions, know the seeing's pain; 
Dazed by the splendor now we grope in vain, 
And in the seeming darkness lose our way. 

We seek for beauty in the set of suns; 
But while we seek it fades. The radiance limns 
The sky, speeding your way ; with you it brims 
Into the Door of Life and Door of Death, 
And beaming from the eyes of little ones 
Lights up your life like his of Nazareth. 



71 



THE NEED 

POOR parts of men, poor halves perhaps, or thirds. 
Who round our little world and think it all 
The universe, philosophers we call 
Ourselves, all else barbarians ; in herds 
Named creeds and schools collect wherein each girds 
A garment not his own, marking him thrall 
To Plato, Kant or Keats, Cephas or Paul, — 
Then flaunts forsooth his weaknesses in words. 

Strongly the hero arms and spite of creeds 
Finds truth where'er it be, — in prose or rhyme, 
In lyrics or in love, dramas, or deeds 
Springing full-arrned from parent thoughts. The time 
Is ripe for men, whole men ; the old earth needs 
A Master who will dare to be sublime. 



72 



TO H. M. B. 

IF life's a field, O friend, set deep the plow! 
Too much at best lies fallow, too much bare, 
Barren and red; too much with little care 
The hireling rudely skims heedless of how 
The winter find the Farmer's empty mow. 

If life's a field, O friend, drive deep the share ! 
But nay, the impervious subsoil still is there; 
I can not turn it to the light, canst thou ? 
I would that life were fluent like the sea, 
With rhythmic tides whose sweep forever brings 
The far-off breathings of eternity, 
And that an Angel, with his garment's hem 
Touching sometimes, down to the depths of them 
Would move the waters winnowed by his wings. 



73 



POETS WE CAU, OURSELVES 

POETS, we call ourselves, and turn our rimes 
Full daintily, with patience infinite 
Seek out the word and phrase most exquisite 
To wail more tunefully our tuneless times. 

For us the bells of life must ring in chimes, 
Ascending and descending, and invite 
To banquets languishing with incense, light, 
And the pale potion Art, which overclimbs 

The sense and dizzies the soul. Better long 
Deep wholesome draughts of living: wine of love, 
Rare, red; strife, keen, exultant; hope and fear. 

Thus only true world-music we shall hear, — 
Its minor chords with major interwove 
In diapasoned chorus rich and strong. 



74 



A POET? YOU A POET? 

A POET ? — You a poet, and must have 
Your viands sauced and fricasseed by a cook? — 
Must spell your inspiration from a book 
As if mere words were runes to damn or save? 

Those heavy-headed weeds that idly wave 
About your knees, if you had skill to look, 
Would build a nobler song, that worm-fence nook 
More fitly stand the lofty architrave. 

To give, not get — this is the high command, 
O brother singer, that the gods impose. 
They give enough and more. Up, swing your blows 

Of sword or sledge, or pour out balm, but stand 
Firm by your gift: better the rudest prose 
Than borrowed beauty doled out second-hand. 



75 



"PER LI CUI PREGM" 

I DREAMED I talked with Dante face to face; 
And ever as his large words reached my mind, 
O'erfiowing its mean measure, I would find 
The remnant shrunken to the commonplace. 

But after, having walked alone a space 
Of the ascending way, I looked behind 
From the high hilltop whence the pathway twined, 
Thinking my toilsome journey to retrace. 

When lo, the words' large meanings lost to me 
Had flourished by the wayside unawares ; 
And some were grown to grain, which angels bound. 

The nearest angel spoke — one laurel-crowned : 
"I aided this man with my company" — 
"Besought," I dreamed he added, "by her prayers." 



76 



SONNETS 



PICTURES AND DREAMS 



The deed with life is dripping wet, 
The thought is shadow to the deed; 
The sphinx's riddle who would read 

Must lose to find, to get forget. 



THE SONNET 

A WOVEN web of song; a flashing gem 
Brought from the perilous deeps of Soul and set 
By kingly Thought upon his coronet! 
It is a plucked-off moment, flower and stem, 
Woven into the poet's anadem; 
It is a deed, a mood, bid stay, and yet 
Beaming with smiles, with passionate tears still wet, 
Or trembling in the memory of them. 
Thus might a God transfix and turn to stone 
The calling priest and fleeing populace, 
Francesca swooning in the rapt embrace, 
The steed with nostrils wide, and him thereon 
With lifted arm and passion on the face 
And all the noise of battle stilled and gone. 



81 



A SONNET WOULDST THOU BUII.D 

A SONNET wouldst thou build? Go learn the rules 
Whereby to lay the walls, learn how and where 
To place the pinnacles that gleam in air, 
The frets and gargoyles chisel with what tools. 
But for the minster gloom mellowed with gules 
And vert on floor and incensed altar stair, 
With prophets glowing-garmented, no care, 
No skill avails, no learning of the schools. 
There shalt thou enter if thou hast the keys — 
Unsandaled, for the place is holy ground ; 
Chastened in thought and vision gaze around ; 
And lo, the worshipers upon their knees, 
The silver lights, the organ's ebbing sound, 
The white-robed priest with low-voiced litanies. 



82 



THEOCRITUS 

HIGH noon beneath the blue Sicilian skies. 
Borne faintly down from out the moveless trees 
Are piny odors and the hum of bees. 
The shrill cicala's song quivers and dies 
Into the quivering air; far mountains rise; 
Beside them rolls the blue of tremulous seas .... 
Here by the ferns in unmolested ease 
Amid his flock the piping shepherd lies. 
Sweet is the silver fountain's rise and fall, 
And sweet the blended piping and the play ; 
But sweeter in our clangorous modern day, 
Rare Singer, is thy gentle spirit-call, 
The soul of Song that echoes far away, 
Thy mind attuned to murmurs musical. 



83 



CUPID AND PSYCHE 

THE moonlight fell upon the slumberer; 
A hushed air breathed that all things holy made; 
Under the lintel of the door he stayed, 
Young Iyove, tall, quivered, fair, fearing to stir. 
Long there he stood like a bright pillager .... 
One hand of hers beneath her cheek was laid 
Half hidden in soft hair. About her played 
Pure dreams that sweet, faint music brought to her. 
He came; the fair dreams fluttered, then they grew 
To fuller music, and a crimson swept 
The slumberer's cheek. Rueful he was, and wept, 
But sprinkled on her lip the bitter dew.... 
He kissed the maiden and was gone. She slept, 
Nor knew 'twas Love and that her dreams were true. 



84 



BARTOLOME RUIZ 

CAROLO QUINTO 

imperante After the French of Heredia 

THIS man is counted of the mighty dead. 
Round the rich strands of new Hesperides 
Where, perfume-winged, forever wafts the breeze, 
His hand has guided and his keel has led. 
Not years alone, the mighty calms, the dread 
And love of that old siren of the seas, 
The swell, the surf, the sharp hoar spray, — 'twas these 
Made hoar his beard of brown, made hoar his head. 
Through him old Castile triumphed, and he bore 
Right proudly that great lion flag of yore 
Round the wide circle of the ocean's rim. 
Prince of all pilots in the days of old, 
He bears on royal arms enriched by him, 
An anchor sable with a chain of gold. 



85 



AUCASSIN AND NICOLKTK 

TO-DAY I looked within a legend rare, 
A moonlight-hidden niche of long ago, 
Wherein faint breezes, rose-oppressed, still blow 
At midnight .... Hush ; note the deep shadows where 
The maiden lily-white with eyes of vair, 
Steals to the buttressed tower. Now do we know 
Whence is this tuning of a lover's woe, 
This weeping o'er a lock of yellow hair. 
It would have set the soul of Keats aglow, — 
The daisies, bent, in moonlight, wet with dew, 
Dark to the marble whiteness of her feet; 
He would have tuned his silver lute-strings low 
To sing this ancient love, it was so true, 
It was so pure, it was so passing sweet. 



86 



MORS VELATA 

THE Form passed by her, veiled, mysterious, 
Mellowing the twilight with a radiance 
That half revealed the hidden countenance 
And limbs in folded white. He moving thus, 
The night grew fragrant, and, not clamorous 
There tolled sweet bells.... Her lips as from a trance 
Pale, virgin as a nun's, for utterance 
Are crimsoned with a passion riotous. 
"Love, Love, 'tis he; with all he lingereth, — 
I know his presence, for my heart is stirred; 
Love, Love, 'tis he; with me he must abide!" 
Then in the gloom she drew the veil aside, 
Atremble, and she saw the face, and heard 
The hollow voice, "I am not Love, but Death." 



87 



THE SINGER 

TO LLOYD MIFFLIN 

OUT from the golden spaces where among 
The splendors lotus-pinioned long he lay, 
Down to the monotone of modern day 
The gods have sent a Singer ever young. 
The glowing gates of Song concordant swung 
To music as he passed ; their winged way 
The harmonies that hold eternal sway 
Sped through the void, whose deeps reverberant rung. 
He comes: with eglantine his locks are bound, 
And poppies red ; his pipe of dulcet tone 
He plays serene and makes melodious moan; 
While see ! the uncouth swain has heard the sound 
And listened, reed to lip : his fields are flown 
And Heliconian fountains sparkle round. 



88 



ARTHUR AND GUINEVERE 

WITH helmets up, in glittering cavalcade 
The victors neared the town. Erect and tall 
The fair-haired king loomed peerless over all: 
On shield and dragon crest the sunlight played .... 
Her long hair bound with circlet gem-inlaid, 
In maiden light undimmed and mystical, 
Half hidden in the shadow of the wall, 
Her women with her, stood the royal maid. 
As in a dream she sees him pass along, 
Round him the clangor and the bray of horn. 
He sees the musing love-light in her eye, — 
Is gone amid the clamor of the throng ; 
But on his ear the noise and shoutings die, 
And all the woe of Arthur's world is born. 



89 



ROSALIND 

SWEET say on, "Coz, coz, that thou didst know 
How many fathom deep I am in love!" 
Say on, "Come woo me, woo me, I would prove 
Whether thou be a lover staid and true." 
Thus limpid as the brook that brawls below, 
Laughter and speech made musical the grove, 
While one apart, where copses interwove, 
As on a stage beheld the lovers go. 
O sweet, say on ! Let thy white pinnace glide 
Softly upon the silver waves of singing; 
Let all the lesser barges draw aside, 
Dipping upon the swell that follows wide, 
While fainter still the marriage bells are ringing 
And nearer break the surges and the tide. 



90 



AMOR TRISTIS 

ONCE in a solemn vision of the night 
Love came unbid, not young and marvelous fair, 
Quivered as he is feigned, with fragrant hair, 
But pale and tall, in folded garb of white. 
I could not see the shadowed features right, 
Save the worn brow: a wreath as poets wear, 
But with the long leaves withered, rested there, 
And from the deep eyes glowed a far-off light. 
"Who art thou? In that pale, sad brow of thine 
And in the far light of those deep, sad eyes 
Burning into my soul, what secret lies?" 
No word he spoke, but drew the folds apart 
Slowly; I saw the ever-flaming heart, 
And from that night his heart of flame was mine. 



9 1 



THE INEPT 

THE whirl and rattle of the noisy street, 
Empty and harsh goes by me ; men with eyes 
Hard as these walls or leaden as the skies 
Stare as they pass me by with clanking beat. 
Have they not known of happiness, the sweet 
And holy joys of home, the love that lies 
Unhidden in its light, the merry cries 
Of welcome, and the sound of little feet? 
Yet I am peer to these. I too am strong, — 
Have mind whose nervy thews could lightly fling 
These puppet men. But heedlessly I long 
Believed in Beauty, — saw her flashing wing ; 
And so I wrought to tune my soul to song, 
Nor made of it a hard and clanging thing. 



92 



ONE SIN THERE IS 

ONE sin there is whereof he has not told 
Who walked the dolorous way .... There are who spent 
Service in vain, who wrought with mind intent 
Humbly at His great Work till they grew old, 
Nor dared the world's rich pageantry behold 
Till on a respite all too brief they bent 
Their eyes aslant and saw, and thenceforth went 
To tasks perforce, — of these he has not told. 
They died. Their memory on earth is fair; 
The deeds they watered long are green and grow ; 
But they, far from the pleasant sun and sky, 
Near where the groans begin and the dun air, 
Thick with dim souls, quivers with one vast sigh, 
Borne on with heads askant, forever go. 



93 



THE FRUIT GIRL 

UPON the city street amid the roar 
Of traffic at its flood I saw her stand, 
A bunch of bright catawbas in her hand, 
Her red lips riper than the fruit she bore. 
I spoke to her, but noting, spoke no more; 
I knew that cluster like a magic wand 
Had waved her, wide-eyed, to a foreign land 
Plucking the vintages in days of yore. 
I learn the lesson in her eyes of brown, 
And leave her to her blue Campania 
With hills afar and silver bowl of bay, 
And journeying youthward over tower and town, 
In distant fields I pass a golden day 
Dreaming my life-dreams till the sun goes down. 



94 



EVENING 

TO H. B. G. 

BLACK, moveless, massed, the live-oaks stand in view 
Against the western mountains lilac-gray 
The crimson o'er whose summits fades away 
Into the wide expanse of silver-blue. 
The young moon, virgin-pale, just peering through, 
Tips the dark oak-trees, and with feeble ray 
Auriga's twin stars shine, — foremost are they 
Of all that one by one their watch renew. 
Near us are cropping cattle in the gloom, 
Nearer the lonely night-bird's uncouth cry ; 
Across far meadows comes the watch-dog's bark 
Reduplicated in the gathering dark; 
And gleaming from the oak-gloom we descry 
A twinkling light, and think of you and home. 



95 



TRISTAN AND ISOVT 

I. THE POTION 

HIS bright locks wet with foam, he went below, 
Wearied with two-fold toil. Isolt was there, 
She with the aureole of sunny hair: 
"Drink bravely now," she smiled, "as thou didst row. 
Laughing they drank there in the twilight glow, 
Nor heard the voice, "Not wine, not wine, beware! 

Then gloom the rapture, passion, mute despair.... 

A shadowed Hand has linked their lives for woe. 
Day after day their vessel plowed the foam 
And climbed the hill of sea; day after day 
The sunlight sparkled, but they knew it not. 
Fame, friendship, honor, — all save love — forgot, 
The rowers' toil is faint and far away, 
And as in dreams they see the hills of home. 



96 



II. THE SAILS 
ff/^ LEAVE the blue waves, my ship with keener prow 

\_J Eill out, ye sails ; I leave you far behind ! 
Look, my beloved, look; we near thee now; 
The sails are white, thy Isolt not unkind. 
Soon thou shalt feel her tresses touch thy brow, 
Her kisses and hot tears, her arms entwined, — 
In her eyes drink again the potion, bind 
Thy soul and her's anew with deathless vow." 
She reached the port, and passed, but did not see, 
The tall fair form with blue eyes steeled in hate, 
That looked, "The sails were black to thine and thee." 
Within the hall she heard the moan, "Too late!" 
Saw lifted from her life the hand of Fate, 
Clasped the dead form and kissed him — and was free. 



97 



SEATTLE 

I SAW her, lusty, sordid, wrapped in gray, 
Upon her mighty ramparts, and behold, 
The blatant voice, "There is no God but Gold, 
And I his prophet," went up night and day. 
Again I saw her, and before her lay 
Her winding ways of sea in silver rolled ; 
And huge Tacoma loomed up white and old, 
Mute with the mystery that has no way. 
Then in my thought I saw the city grow 
To marble, and a thousand masts as one 
Pointing aloft.... Thus on a hilltop long 
A prophet stood of old, then broke to song ; 
And all the tents of Jacob lay below 
Full in the glitter of the rising sun. 



THE DRAMAS OF SHAKESPEARE 

THOSE morning stars that stud the firmament, 
Golden and amber in the heavens hung, 
That now for these three centuries have sung 
Young-orbed, in light that never shall be spent,— 
Were they by an arm cloud-veiled, omnipotent, 
While loud with music the wide concave rung, 
Forth from the seething bounds of Chaos flung 
For signs and seasons and man's wonderment ? 
Or rather were they — O how dim we see, 
Straining our eyes to pore upon the scroll — 
Dream-woven from the tissue of a soul 
Too great for us in its humanity, 
Each splendid star still vibrant with the whole 
Rich, wondrous life, majestical and free? 

LofC. 



99 



BY THE FIRESIDE 



THE WIND SONG 

A WIND came stealing out of the west, 
Blow wind blow; 
It rocked the mother bird in her nest, 

Blow wind blow. 
The mother-bird sat with open eye; 
(The cedar waved his arms on high) 
She felt the warm eggs under her breast, 
She saw the poplar bend his head, 
And, far below, the roses red 
Nod to the wind as he passed them by 
And round them strewed their petals sped: 
Pity to take them, but he knows best; 

Blow wind blow. 

She saw the fleecy clouds above, — 

Blow wind blow, — 
The sky so blue, the fields below, 
The sunshine with its golden glow; 
She heard the cooing turtle-dove; 
She saw the white ships far away 



103 



The Wind Dancing upon the silver bay. 

Song. She saw and was glad the livelong day; 

But whence was the wind and whither it blew 
She never asked and she never knew — 
Blow wind blow. 



TO A CHILD 

A LITTLE note, its music lasts not long, 
But, sweet and true, 
The reapers at the noontide hear the song, 
Look up and see the blue. 



104 



FELICITAS 

f f T IylTTI/B wife that loves him through and through ; 
jLjL Just coy enough to keep love ever new." 
This gift is mine; and if a god should say, 
"Choose what thou wilt, for thou mayst have to-day 

Wealth, Fame, and Ease with all their retinue," 

This my reply: "All thou canst hold to view 

Is dross wherewith I know not what to do; 

My cup of joy is full if there but stay 
A little wife. 

But hold ! for there is room besides for two, — 
A brown-eyed boy, a lass with eyes of blue. 
Lo, both are mine, and life is one long May 
With these three gifts. If need be, take away 
Health, home, and friends, but leave me long in lieu 

A little wife 

And children two." 



105 



MOTHKR-LOVE 

A YOUTH went from his father's door 
To seek his fortune far away ; 
And after years returned once more 
To where the peaceful valley lay; 
But changed by travel toil and sin, 
None knew him, none would let him in. 

"I'll hasten homeward; there," said he, 
"For me the evening hearth will burn; 

There, surely, friends will welcome me, 
And all rejoice at my return.". . . 

An unknown face the father scanned, 

The watchdog bit his outstretched hand. 

His brother sharply spoke to him; 

To gaze, his sisters left their chores; 
His mother, weak of sight and limb, 

Beheld him through the open doors. 
She knew him, spite of toil and years, 
And ran and kissed him mid her tears. 



106 



A VOYAGER 

A VOYAGER, upon an untried sea 
Embarked but yesterday, his compass new, 
His chart unread, asleep the airy crew 
Of hopes and fears and passions yet to be. 

Still to his ear attuned, the melody 
Of far-off bells across the sunlit blue 
Sounds silverly, while dim upon his view 
The mystic groves bend dark above the lea. 

Oh, he shall bravely sail, his guide the stars, 
And chiefly those twin stars, a mother's eyes, 
Hid from the pilot by no clouded bars. 

Through storm and calm his bark shall sink and rise 

Until he enter port with steady spars 

And gaze upon new lands in vague surprise. 



107 



WHAT THE CHICK SAID 

I WISH I were a gosling, 
A little gosling gray ; 
I'd paddle out to mid-stream 
And smoothly float away. 
The sunny banks would widen, 
The wavelets nod and play; 
I'd leave my sister goslings 
Miles away. 

I'd sail toward the ocean, 

The ocean deep and blue; 
Its curling waves would courtesy, 

And I would courtesy too. 
I'd float into the sunset, 

Beyond the ocean foam, — 
But since I am no gosling 

I'll stay at home. 



108 



SONGS OF A SHOE 

I 

A SONG of a little brown shoe 
That is torn at the heel and the toe! 
And what is your mother to do 
But kiss the piggies all five a row, 
Quite down to the one that said wee, — see, see ! 
Through the hole in the little brown shoe? 

A song of a little torn shoe ! 

Your papa another will buy, 

For a lad that can toddle like you 

As quick as a chick, as neat and as spry, 

B'rom the sofa across to the chair, — take care ! — 

Is too old for a little torn shoe. 

A song of a little torn shoe! 
Come, see where I store it to stay 
With trinkets of Brown-eyes and Blue, 
Until my babies have wandered away, — 
And then in my heart of hearts for aye 
Will I treasure this little brown shoe. 



109 



w 



Songs of a IJ 

Shoe 

'HAT'S bid? How much do you bid for the lot? 

Twenty-five ? . . . . fifteen ? one dime ? 

Here are dozens of quaint old trinkets and toys 

To gladden the hearts of your girls and boys. 

We are standing here wasting our time. One dime, 

One dime! Will you start it or not? 

A bid ! Who'll put five on ? five on ? 
A bid ! a bargain for you. 

Fifteen! fifteen ! Agoing, gone ! 

And I throw in the little brown shoe. 

It is torn at the heel and the toe, 

And its buttons are two in a row; 

But you've bought these goods at a bargain you know, 

And I Throw in the little brown shoe. 



STOPS OF VARIOUS QUILLS 



Not on land and not on sea 
Shall the realm of poet be, 
Nor a world of sight and sound 
Be his true abiding ground. 
Wider than the sea-ways are, 
Higher than the utmost star, 
Deeper than e'er plummet ran, 
In the heart and mind of man 
He shall fix his bright domain, 
Rear his palaces and reign. 



YEARS AND CHANGE 

I MET a friend 
Whose life did hold 
My life in his 
In days of old. 

He clasped my hand, 
We broke the spell 
The silent years 
Had wrought so well. 

We broke the spell, 
For face to face, 
We spoke of naught 
But commonplace. 

We bade adieu, 
He clasped my hand ; 
I saw the tear, 
I understand. 



"5 



THE NEOPHYTK 

THE body I despise, 
The soul is all; 
Love-looks from thy langorous eyes 
Cannot hold me thrall. 

Thy kisses are forgot 
With all their pain; 
And thy tears can move me not 
Though they fall like rain. 

Thy wealth of human love, 

Poured out like wine, 
Waste not, for high above 

I have fixed mine. 



116 



OCTOBER 

From the German of Erich Jansen 

FOR the parting feast her room she has garnished; 
With costliest hangings she decks the wall; 
Her glittering gifts to the guests are furnished 
And scattered about through the banquet hall. 

Like a king of the North when the "skoals!" are ringing, 
In the throng of his bards and his vassals bold, 
She rises and goes from the feast and singing 
Through the death-door splendid with purple and gold. 



117 



THE PARTING 

"TTTHEN the swallows homeward fly, . 
JL A Though to-day we part in pain"' 
Thus we sing and know not why, 
When the swallows homeward fly 
Circling in the crimson sky: 

Lies in light the summer plain 
When the swallows homeward fly. 

"Though to-day we part in pain, 

Shall, O shall we meet again 
When the swallows homeward fly?" 

Hush, my heart, why dost complain: 

"Shall, O shall we meet again?" .... 

Darkens all the summer plain, 
Fades the crimson from the sky. 

Shall, O shall we meet again 
When the swallows homeward fly ? 



118 



PHYLLIS 

BEFORE the lark has left her home and soared 
above the blue, 
Before the sun has kissed the hills and stolen the 

drops of dew, 
She trips adown the meadow while the twinkling of 

her feet 
Leaves trembling all the diamonds upon the grasses 

sweet, 
And calls the cows, "Come Bess, come Boss, why 

tarry ye so long? 
The milkers wait beside the gate the buttercups 

among." 

But when the west in gold is drest and sunken is 

the sun, 
When milking pails hang up in rows and all the 

milking's done, 
She trips adown the mead again while shadows 

deepen round 
And flowerets try to touch her hem or bow them 

to the ground; 

119 



Phyllis The streamlet silent all the day sings long and 
loud with glee 
When Phyllis conies to where I wait beneath the 
trysting tree. 



TO A HOUSEWIFE 

BUSY brain and busy feet! 
Hand doth plot and heart doth beat 
I/ife to nourish and complete. 

Singing heart and buoyant will! 

Weary, weary ! busy till 

Children's sounds grow faint and still. 

Weary, weary ! daylight dies 

Whence the Sabbath calm that lies 
In the hazel of her eyes? 



THE WEDDING GOWN 

LAST night she wore her wedding gown, 
I kissed her when I came. 
The leaves of life are falling down, 
The light within her eyes of brown 

Is still the same, 
Or gentler, deeper than the day 
She laid the wedding gown away. 

Last night she wore her wedding gown, 

And she shall wear it once again ; 
The wheels of time will be run down, 
The light within her eyes of brown 

Be faded then, 
The hand responseless to the will, — 
The voice of music shall be still. 



MAIDEN FANCIES 

IN THE HAMMOCK 

A SHIP is sailing over the sea — 
Sails of white on a sea of blue — 
A bird is blown across the lea, 
A word is whispered low to me, 
"Love, be true, be true." 

The sails are gone, — ah, woe is me! — 

Only a sky of summer blue, 
Only the sounds of bird and bee 
And the rustling leaves of an apple tree 
With glints of sunlight through. 



WAITING Maiden 

Fancies 

THE chestnuts patter amid the leaves, 
Southward clatter the birds in flocks; 
In ivies twined beneath the eaves 
A rustling wind at twilight grieves, 

In moonlight glitter the huskers' shocks. 

The dawn is bitter with frost on plain, 

The sky is deep, the woods are red, 
The world is sweet in its dying pain, — 

My heart is dying, my life is dead: 
The days are singing, but I am dumb, 
Love comes not and he will not come. 



123 



HEART OF THE ROSE 

OLOVE, O heart of love, how like a rose 
Prom bud to flower the perfumed leaves unclose. 
The red its passion and the light of youth, 

The bud its promise of the wealth to be, 
The flower its fullness and the thorn its ruth, 
And the heart of the rose, Love, only thee. 

A song will linger when the singer is dead; 
The fragrance ceases when the flower is shed. 
The canker gnaws, the suns of summer blight, 

The leaves are scattered with the season's change, 
But the rose has been with its form of light, — 

Be glad and it is, nor count it strange. 



124 



THROUGH THE YEARS 

OMOON, do you shine on a wanderer still, 
Of a grave by the desolate sea? 
The long night I dream that the silver-tipped waves 
Are wafting him nearer to me. 

Or sometimes he sails where the Indian isles, 

Asleep like a dream-laden soul, 
With their dark forests dip to the mystical waves 

That noiselessly quiver and roll. 

And sometimes in battle that silently sweeps 

O'er hillsides that redden with gore, 
And gleam as with flashes of dark thunder clouds, 

He leads in an echoless war. 

False? No, rather say that he sleeps 'neath the brine, 

Deep under the troublous tide, — 
That the coral waves o'er him instead of the rose, 

And the glow worm shines dim by his side. 



125 



MEDEA 

SHE gathers magic herbs at night 
And steeps them by the moon's dim light 
In potions strong for bane and blight, — 
Medea. 

Her dark eyes weave into my verse; 
I dare not here their tale rehearse 
Who spent their dying breath to curse 
Medea. 

I say, "Enchantress, weave thy spell 
Around the souls thou lovest well; 
Enwrap them with the chains of hell, 
Medea. 

"And when love turns to bitterness, 
With naught to cherish, none to bless 
O then be thou my patroness, 
Medea. 



126 



But lo, these potent spells are naught, Medea 

For when this dark, unholy thought 
Thine eyes within my soul have wrought, 
Medea, 

I hear a voice that falters not: 
"Forgive; they do they know not what" — 
And all thy magic is forgot, 
Medea. 



WORLD-WEARY 

I AM weary of this striving, 
This struggle man to man, 
Where all bear down the vanquished, 
And each gets all he can. 

I long for the days of boyhood 
When from the early morn 

I followed all day the harrow 
And tended the covered corn. 
127 



World The long rows led to the upland ; 

Beyond, the view was wide: 
I saw the yellow wheatfields 
Dotting the country side; 

I saw the distant city, 

Its steeples rising high, 

The far-off hazy mountains 
And, over all, the sky. 

My heart went out to the city, 
Where victories were won, — 

Beyond the purple mountains 

That hid the setting sun 



But now I yearn for something 
That left me long ago, — 

A sense of breadth and freedom 
That only a boy can know ; 

And I would leave forever 
The cursed marts of men, 

And back in the long-rowed corn field 
Dream all s my life again. 
128 



THE CLOSED GENTIAN 

ff ~K WAKE, awake," the west wind blew, 
XJL "The morning sun has smiled on you. 

The autumn flowers heard the call 

And laughed to see the dead leaves fall. 

The aster's purple crown expands, 
The daisies clap their little hands; 

And all look up to greet the sun, 
And all are fair and glad save one. 

To her the west-wind comes in vain 
With whisperings of sky and plain. 

He sings, "Oh, open lids of blue, — 
Open and bathe in light and dew. 

"Thy regal sister's azure cup 
Untwines to drink the sunshine up ; 



129 



The Closed "Her wealth of calyx, fringe, and stem 
Genhan She wears like queen her diadem. 



"Like her unfold, and feel the breeze; 
Oh wake and hear the hum of bees, 

"And with thy robe of blue unfurled, 
Behold the sky and beauteous world." 

She faintly hears, she longs and thrills 
To see the wondrous sky and hills ; 

But fate is stern : the breeze is gone . . . 
She opened not and still dreamed on, 

And all day long the butterfly 
Beheld her closed and flitted by. 



130 



AI.ONK 

IT IS not hard when men surround 
The Singer, learn his songs by rote, 
And if he only sing a note 
Piece out the song and praise the sound, 
It is not hard for Singer then 
To sing high helpful songs to men. 

But when the hard world claims its own, 
And he must speak in commonplace 
Lest men should wonder to his face; 
Or work in silence and alone, — 
Then it is hard: he must hide deep 
His songs in border realms of sleep, 
Or hoard and count them, overbold, 
As some poor miser counts his gold. 



131 



A LAST WORD 

I KNOW not that the morning stars 
Planned and plotted to make us one; 
Nor that before these lives of ours, 
The webs were interspun. 

I know I met a girl of girls, 

Brown-eyed and laughing, in days of yore ; 
My heart was tangled in her curls, 

And caught. I know no more. 

A glance upon the crowded street: 

The Destinies for all I know 
Guided the gentle little feet, — 

I think it happened so. 

But when I hear my children's mirth, 
And when they climb upon my knee, 

I ask not if the lord of Earth 
Be Chance or Destiny ; 



132 



And when a hand is laid in mine A Last 

Gently, as in the long ago, Word 

I thank the Will and Ways divine 
That it is ordered so. 



THE SONG 

THE words were simple as a child's, 
The tune was like the words ; 
In silver notes it rose and fell 
As liquid as a bird's; 

But all of life was far away 

Upon a golden ground, 
And all the seeming solid world 

Was melted into sound. 



133 



FAR, FAR AWAY 

FAR, far away, beyond the mountains blue 
Whose silver summits hid the sun from view, 
A lad, he saw the veil of golden mist 
Faded from earth, and, blent with amethyst, 
And skyways with irradiant glories strew. 

He marveled much what fair fruit yonder grew 
On what fair trees in lands forever new, 

What other suns what other mountains kissed, 
Far, far away. 

The western years are mellowed and are few, 

The sunset mists still linger in adieu: 

Skyward he turns and looks with yearning wist 
Where they, transmuted by the Achemist, 

Shall soon be mingled in a fairer hue, 
B'ar, far away. 



134 



A GIRL 

LIGHTLY SHE WALK !& 
OVER THE SURFACE OF 
HER FOURTEEN YEARS 

LIGHT and mirth on lifted chin, 
Sunlight weaving out and in 
With the ripples of her hair, — 
Fair she is, and silver- fair; 
Sweet and maiden-sweet is she, 
Wrapped about with mystery. 

What to her is like, I ween 
I have heard and I have seen, 
When and where I cannot say, 
Long ago and far away. 
Was't perchance a song of bird, 
Or the ripple of a stream 
Hid in shadows, overheard 
In old forests, half adream? 
Or the broken bits of song 
Sweet with silences not long, 
Murmured in an unknown tune 
On a morning moist with June ? 
Or a lily ? or the light 
In her chalice exquisite ? 
135 



A Girl Or the silver radiance 

On a quiet lake's expanse, 
Etched in blue, with banks below 
Clear and soft and tremulous? 

But the symbol flees me thus : 
Not in aught we see or know 
Framed in time or circumstance, — 
Not in rise or set of sun, 
Aught that's ended or begun, 
Still in sound or sight or word, 
I have seen and I have heard. 
All things that in nature are; 
Rise of sun and set of star, 
Fruit and fragrance, song of bird 
In old forests overheard, 
Sun and shadow, sound of stream 
Lapsing in midsummer dream, 
Lilies shedding light around, 
Treetops nodding with no sound, — 
All are pulsings and have part 
In the universal Heart, 
Which in mighty systole 
Urges up to man and tree 

136 



And in rhythmic after-lull A Girl 

Flushes into beautiful. 

Sound and sight and fragrance, all 

Blent in union magical, 

These and more than these is she, 

Wrapped about with mystery, 

Fragment of the boundless Soul 

Shaping to the lower Whole, 

Dimmed by bounds, but dewy wet, 

Broken surface gleaming yet. 

Maiden-sweet, with open eyes, 
On the brink of mysteries! 
Seeing not, yet all things seeing 
To the limpid depths of Being, 
Shaming those poor truths that lie 
Open to the studied eye. 

Ah, the water crystalline 
Dimples, on the verge of wine; 
Dim, anear the Master stands 
Blessing it with holy hands. 
Hushed and holy, in her breast 
Quickenings of vague unrest, 
And afar the waverings 

137 



A Girl As of wide flamboyant wings. 

Does she see in vision large 
Motherhood with misty marge 
Tremulous, with gleams of gold, 
Loosing all the bonds that hold 
Self as self, entwining her 
With the years that, will be — were, 
Till are linked the mundane Hours 
With the purpose of the stars? 
Wakes she? Titan-new, uphurled, 
Huge there looms our later world; 
Wakes she? sing her songs that lull, 
Sleeping is so beautiful; 
Soothe her heart to dreams, anon 
Crimson riot there shall run; 
Tune the lute to melody 
Lest, the chords of Being smit 
In tumultuous harmony, 
Love, the Master, shatter it. 

Child of light, some radiance 
Years have dimmed and custom reft; 
Keep, O keep what still is left, — 
Beauty in her dreamful trance, 
138 



Robed in white, invisible A Girl 

Till the Prince shall break the spell; 

Keep, O keep her still a girl 

Heeding more one sunny curl 

Than all the muffled din of wars, 

Kingdoms, thrones, and conquerors: 

Past is dim for bane or bliss, 

And the present only is. 

Leave her ? Aye, if nature can, 
Who still leadeth star and man, 
And with fearless "Follow me," 
Smiles on our perplexity. 
And this crystal house of glass 
Whereby men as pictures pass, 
Be it well or be it ill, 
Let be shattered when it will. 
Past may dim with Time and Use, 
More remains for much we lose; 
Wider still and wider grow 
Bounds of wonder, as must be, 
Bounded by eternity. 
Pressing on, we pause, and lo, 
Past again is set aglow. 

139 



A Girl "Beautiful!" with maiden breath, — 

Beauty ever is before, — 
"Beautiful!" in marriage wreath, 
Gazing through the o'pen door, 
"Beautiful!" the spirit saith 
Peering through the doors of Death. 

Light and mirth on lifted chin, 
Sunlight weaving out and in 
With the ripples of her hair, 
Fair she is, and silver- fair; 
Sweet and maiden-sweet is she 
Wrapped about with mystery. 



140 



THE POET OF THE DOVES 

TO JOAQUIN MILLER 

AIvONE he watches from the heights 
The sea-gates dim their golden bars, 
Or muses through the summer nights, — 
Below, the myriad city lights, 
Above, the stars. 

And all the mountain bursts to sound, 

The air to voices seraph-strong ; 
The hill-side now is holy ground, 
And every bush and tree around 

Flames into song. 

The world is new, with space and room ; 

Dim shapes are seen of things to be ; 
He sees emerge from primal gloom, — 
Ten thousand miles, with crash and boom, — 

The line of sea. 

Childlike, he knows not great and grand ; 

A soul suspires in every clod ; 
And, set throughout this western land, 
The everlasting mountains stand 

White tents of God. 
141 



The Poet of Our lower lives with clank and jar, 
the Doves Are gof tened into k armon i es ; 

And through the world by ways that are 
Changeless and dim, he sees afar 
Men walk as trees. 

But if some Python wrong arise 

Waking him from his dream of peace, 
And charm the world with serpent eyes, 
He thrusts beneath the scale of lies 
Like Hercules. 

Grey poet, long thy rhymes have rung, 
And long have lingered like a bell ; 
I know not if since Shakespeare sung, 
The sweetness of our English tongue 
Was known so well. 

And the great Singer who shall come 

To shape our lives to larger ends, — 
To whom men's hearts will not be dumb, 
But lean to listen as the hum 
Of spheres descends, 



142 



And leaning, hear the music grow The Poet 0/ 

To tones of organ harmony, v s 

Till plain and mountain here below, 

And all the things of life, shall flow 
Full as the sea, 

And, hearing whom, men's lives shall spring 

To life to meet his own again, — 
He will touch hand to many a string, 
But clear in every song shall ring 

Thy wild, sweet strain. 

Poet, this gray old world has wrongs, 

But ah, the gray dove has her nest! 
Sing for the peace thy spirit longs, 
But more, sing on your twilight songs 

With sense of rest. 

Your western mountain peaks are white; 

Dashes in foam the sea you love. 
The room; the rest! But men will write 
When twilight ends and it is night, 

"A mateless dove." 



143 



BARON STIEGEL 



Written for the "Feast of Roses' 
held at Manheim, Pennsylvania. 



AN OLD man sitting by an open door 
Under an oak! The school-day work is done, 
The sound of children's voices, fainter now, 
Now faded quite upon the outward ear, 
Is borne far inward, blending with a life 
Long, strenuous, and somewhat loud with action, 
Grown dim in dreams. Sorrows and joys are there; 
But the tumultuous triumphs now are faint, 
As the long billows of a resonant sea 
Surging in white are voiceless to the ear 
Dulled to the roar by silent leagues between. 
Only the griefs are loud; time dulls not them: 
The dead estranged rise up and look reproach, 
The friends grown cold walk with averted eyes, 
And all the world is dead. What if through him 
Some dozen hungry mouths were stopped with bread? 
What if in years long past skies were aglow 
Till midnight with some paltry furnaces 
Lit up by him ? A greater than a king 
Claimed guest-rites of him — Washington, — what then ? 

144 



That banquet soothes not hunger of the heart. Baron 

Gold had been scattered from his hands like grain: ^> tte S el 

Where is the harvest? for he reaps it not; 

All, all is dead ; the music all is marred 

By the loud closing of the prison doors 

And the rude clanking of his debtor's-chains, 

Or stilled in the long silence. One small gift 

Of a scant plot of ground where men may pray 

And the dead lie without rent save for the fee, 

Annual, of one red rose plucked from a grave, 

Fed upon ashes that were reddened lips, — 

Only this deed this product of a whim 

Gleams in the fabric of his finished life 

Like slender thread of gold, but gleams not long, 

Fading with all the colors of his life 

Dimmed by the shadows of blank prison walls. 

One rose plucked from the grave ! Strange toll of Death 
To Life! The grave holds all he loves of life; 
Above them grow the roses that men plucked 
To pay his rents .... And so he muses long, 
When lo, out of the darkness round, a face 
Mildly looks down and mellows all with light. 

145 



Baron She who had walked with him the way of life, 
* Drinking with him from wayside wells of joy, 

Helping to bear the burdens in the heat 
Of noon, and in the dark that covered them 
Struggling till she grew faint and could no more, — 
She comforts him. B'reed from the weight of years 
He looks again into her eyes of love 
And sees again the future now long past, 
Fair as a morning tremulous with dew 
And misty toward the mountains. Now he walks 
Again with her the way — it is not long; 
The world again is plastic to his will, 
Recolored to his vision by his will, 
Wearing the livery of his interests. 
Then, led by her a spirit, spiritualized 
By her, as from a hilltop of the mind 
He sees his life in colors as it is; 
He sees his deeds, some like the winter torrents 
Which men had marked by their incessant roar 
Now sunk in barren sands. And that one whim, 
The sale for one red rose, a little stream 
Gleaming in tenuous silver, wider grows 
And wider till the meadows of the world 
146 



It nourishes, and, making tributary Baron 

All his long life, flows onward to the sea. * 

But now the night has blotted out the plain, 
And his white hair is lifted by the breeze. 
His dream is done. 

Now all his dreams are done; 
Only the lesson of his life remains, 
Wafted to us with fragrance of the rose, — 
To us, an age that loves gold overmuch, 
Prone to bow down before the empty Form, 
Forgetting that save Love have entered in, 
Informed it, and breathed-in the breath of life, 
Our work is clay and crumbles to the touch 
Of the rude years. Rich are we ; yea, and wise ! 
We would reach heaven by material means, 
Building a Babel out of brick and stone: 
There shall be left no stone upon another 
Unless we build in love and on His Law, 
Leaving wide windows for the living soul. 

Courage ! There shall be light. Chisel and hew, 
And match the massive blocks in buttresses 
Pillar and groin: there is an Architect; 

147 



Baron The immortal spirit cannot be immured. 

Stiegel xhere will be light; even this little rift, 
This day we celebrate, lets sunlight in ; 
All will be builded by the deathless mind 
Into a glorious temple for the soul, 
A goodly habitation for the King. 

Roses, red roses then : they will endure 
Longer than brazen tablets; they will teach 
When marble monuments are blown in dust: 
Life out of death and beauty from decay, 
Love from the unlovely, and fragrance in the world. 



148 



FATE AND OVER-FATE 

''The law of Chance is the law of Souls." 

THIS moment, Love, you stood beside my chair, 
Deep shadowed in a wreath of raven hair, 
And looking from the dark of soulful eyes 
Upon me as in pleading and despair. 

It seemed you spoke: "The bond that Love doth knit 
Is stronger than the strength of human wit. 
To break it can avail not Time nor Wont: 
It must endure with Him that orders it. 

"When soul to soul unbosoms in a glance, 
And trembles in the rapture of its trance, 
The unborn generations plead for light, 
And lo, their pleadings mock at circumstance." 

The vision slowly faded, but I saw 

Down to the sources whence our lives we draw. 

These walls of stone were vanished, and the stars 
Shone to the utmost deeps — and all was law. 



149 



Fate and There as the thousand sided dice were thrown 
Over-Fate whereby the little lives of men are known, 

Thine fell with mine : I looked to see the tale, — 
I looked and saw they differed but by one. 

The vision changes : things to be unfold ; 
Suns, constellations, back to mist are rolled ; 

I hear the rush of Time, and, swept along, 
Alternate flash new systems and grow old. 

Then, after permutations infinite, 

Now Form and Law, now Chaos, Void, and Night, 

Again above me shine Aldebaran 
And all the old familiar worlds of light. 

A1K things arenas they were. Our fates are cast ; 
They waver as before, but lie at last: 

And look, O look ! for now they lie as one, 
Swayed by the love of countless ages past. 



150 



WHENCE? WHITHER? 

WHENCE am I? Whither? 
Out of the darkness into the light, 
Dazed by the sunbeams — the glare is too bright, 
Soon to be borne again into the night, — 
Whence am I ? — Whither ? 

Floated down hither, 
Still do I grope mid the maze of the known 
Fearing to find it a vision alone, 
Hearing in silence the dark waters moan, 

Floating me hither. 

Whither? ah, whither? 
Down to the blue of an infinite sea, 
Tideless and shoreless: it waiteth for me. 
Whither I know not, and }'et I shall be 

Wafted down thither. 



151 



VALUES 



VALUES 



WOULD you hold in your hand the first flush 
Of a morning in spring ? 
My birds are all birds in the bush, — 
How sweetly they sing! 



II 

BETTER than the sharpened sense 
Gained of hard experience, 
Better than the narrowed self 
Centered but in name and pelf, 
Is the vision wide of youth 
Circled by no bounds but truth. 



Ill 

There came to him a radiant Dream, — 
It flushed his cheek and then was gone. 
He felt the tremor of its wings, 
But he slept on. 

155 



Values There came a Thought; and he was thrilled 
To rap ure by the visioned Thought. 
He saw the Good and whence it springs; 
But others wrought. 

An Impulse touched him light as air; 

He stooped and kissed a little child. 
He added to the sum of things 

When the infant smiled. 



V 

"By heaven, I had rather coin my heart, 
And drop my blood for drachmas'" 



THE form and substance strangely join, 
And Matter subtly blends with Will; 
Then stamp your life to current coin, 
And let it jingle in the till. 

The gold you place within your purse, 
'Tis but a part that turns the beam ; 

The Visible is life's reverse, 

Its obverse, spirit, thought, and dream. 



156 



Values Then melt the ore, and mix and mold, 
And let it have the current ring; 
And stamp it into deed of gold 
Fit for the great world's trafficking. 



VI 

HE thought to build his life and planned 
To fashion with a master hand, 



But trusting to himself alone 
He wept above a heap of stone. 

So now the Architect has planned. 
He lays each stone with reverent hand, 

Sees not what domes and towers shall rise 
And glitter in the evening skies, 

But works and trusts, and knows 'twill be 
A temple fitting, fair to see. 



157 



Values VII 

llj IFE it floweth like a stream"— 

J 1 Truly, but — we know it. 

"Lives like barks adrift, adream, — " 
Guess my riddle, poet: 

Some with banked oars smoothly glide, 
With the current going ; 

Some the eddies draw aside 
Spite of all their rowing. 

Round they whirl and round and round, 
Striving for the middle; 

Striving lost and trusting found... 
"Life may solve her riddle, — 

"Life may solve it. Launch aright, 
Trust with oar-beat steady. 

Pull away with gladsome might 
From undertow and eddy." 



158 



FROM THE HILI/TOP 

BELOW, the city lies in light, 
Steeped in the sunset through and through, 
A dream in gold and marble-white 
Encircled with a bay of blue. 

Upward ascend the vapors curled, — 

I hear the lessening toil of men; 
I have my vision of the world, 

And go upon my way again. 



For be it truth or spell of sun, 

The world-noise, strident bit by bit, 

Is blent and molded into one, 
And spheral music mellows it. 



*59 



A DIRGK 

DEAD the Spirit; sound her knell. 
Thus begin: 
"Life is left, but is it well? 
Life is but an empty shell; 
Nevermore shall Spirit dwell 
Fair within. 

"Laugh aloud the fiends of hell, 

Peeping in. 
'See the joyless Soul,' they tell, — 
'Trusted Beauty! did she well? 
Beauty failed, and now our spell 

Binds to sin.' " 

Dead the Spirit? Nay, not so; 

Cease the knell. 
Evil Soul must see and know 
Ere to fuller life she grow, 
Spirit sleep, then fairer glow; 

All is well. 



160 



TO OMAR KHAYYAM 

Ah, Omar, sweet and strong your stratn, 
But life is sweeter, stronger still; 

Nearer to us than joy or pain, 

The breathing of the incarnate will. 



I 

I READ again old Persian Omar's lay 
Dripping with ruby wine of dim To-day, 
And mused until the rising winds of Mood 
Have made my heart a harp whereon they play. 

Out of the formless deeps of Soul they blow; 

Misty with shapes and weird with sounds they grow; 

Then touching on the strings reverberant, 
On to the formless deeps of Soul they go. 



II 

ONCE, Omar, I too sought with rule and line 
A human soul to measure and define, — 
x6i 



To Omar Strove to unweave the twisted strands of fate 

Khayyam And separate the human and Divine. 



From base to where the dizzying turrets ran, 
I saw a great life builded by a man; 

The more I looked, the more I wondered where 
The human ended and the God began. 

A speck of foam upon a breathing sea, 
One little note in a vast harmony, 

A son who looks upon his father's face, — 
These are the visions of the ME in Thee. 

Bubbles that from the sea's own substance rise, 
A son with radiance from his father's eyes, 

These are the visions of the Thee in me, 
But Thou art nearer, in a subtler wise. * 

Sons — but the father's guiding hand is o'er; 
Notes — but the harmony is these and more ; 
Bubbles — but millions on the sea shall rise 
And the great sea in greater fulness roar. 



162 



A little note — its music lasts not long. 

A little note? In discord, aye; but strong, 

Accordant with the diapasoned whole, 
It breathes enduring entities of song, 



To Omat 
Khayyam 



Which move along in simple melody, 
Or, organ-throated, in an ample key 

Of deeds that wake within a thousand deeds 
Reverberations rolling endlessly. 

And shall the one clear note we call a soul 
Make discord in the music of the Whole? 

The son — shall he abjure his heritage 
And sell his birthright for an empty bowl? 



Ill 

I SOUGHT to know the mystery of pain, 
And long I peered in darkness, but in vain, 
For when it seemed I saw a little light, 
A door was closed, and all was dark again. 



"Light out of darkness, joy from pain shall grow;" 
"Darkness must be that we the light may know." 
163 



To Omar But ah, the long long while! and why was built 

Khayyam ^ world with such broad buttresses of woe? 

Why can the lark not sing and rear her brood 
Save on the poor lives of a multitude? 

Why must there die that I may move or breathe, 
A million cells — for my so little good ? 

"But if the cells could wake and dimly see 
Within the threshold of the greater ME, — " 

The door was closed, deep in my heart I heard, 
"If soul but wake, can pain and evil be?" 



IV 

THOSE thirsty pots of Ramaz&n, which thou, 
Old Omar, knewest, — the unbeliever's plow 
Has dug them from the dust of Naishapur: 
'Tis moonlight ; they are not loquacious now. 



The grass has grown above the broken heap 
And sunk its roots in crack and receive- deep, 

And in the moonlight on the moveless spears 
The dew-drops hang like silver stars — asleep. 
164 



And of the hanging drops, some seven or eight To Omar 

Have slid on the last whole pipkin's side and sate — ayyam 

Imbibing the loquacity of the pots — 
In judgment on the doubtful things of fate. 

"Congealed from out the Nothing," one began, 
"Reflecting borrowed light a little span, 

Then fading to the Nothing whence we sprung, 
What is the purpose, pray, and what the plan?" 

Another spoke: "What talk of ME and THEE? 
Vibrations of the Nothing make the ME. 

The light and whence it comes are nothing else 
Than whirlings of the Nothing such as we." 

An elder: "Can the heart of Nothing ache? 
And thought for the to-morrow can it take ? 

Hear; the dim truths at my conglobing learned 
And in my essence mirrored, I will speak. 

' The smallest part that forms these globes of ours 
(Compounded how and by what greater Powers?) 
Reflects — and not less truly than the whole — 

Orion and the pomp of rolling stars. 
165 



To Omar "And when the subtile, all-pervading Sun 
™ The bond has loosed that binds us into one, 

What sweeter Influence shall rule us then! — 
What pulsings that through all Creation run! 

"When I upon the swaying mists of morn, 
Or on the breezes of the valley borne, 

Shall faint with scents of every garden rose 
And toss and tremble with the rustling corn; 

"Or when in crimson splendors deep I lie 
Behind the bastions of the sunset sky, 

And feel the trembling of the utmost star, 
Shall I not feel and know that I am I?" 

He spoke : the sky grew ruddy with the dawn ; 
Above, the moon still rode — but ah, how wan ! — 

The long slant sunbeams woke the world and fell 
Athwart the pebbled plains of wide Iran. 

I heard a sigh — it seemed of jars athirst — 

And groans (I know not if they blessed or cursed.) 

I looked upon the heap ; the drops were gone, 
And lo, the Sufi pipkin's sides were burst. 
166 



V To Omar 

A THOUGHT took form. It builded walls of stone Khayyam 
It summoned, for it would not dwell alone, 
All Thought, all Wisdom, and they dwelt therein 
Subdued to music of the master-tone. 

It strove with men to make them truly wise; 
New light it kindled in a thousand eyes; 

It touched the ailing Hour and healed it, — helped 
The weak and trodden under foot to rise. 

A sculptor wrought in stone, and, bit by bit, 
Day after day he shaped the dream that lit 
His own poor life until the life he missed 
Grew in the statue and transfigured it. 

In loneliness of art the statue stood; 

And he, a maker, saw and called it good; 

When lo, the dream that lit his life afar 
Had entered and become as flesh and blood. 

"Yes, but a breath, the walls of stone decay: 
The dreamer and the statue, where are they? 



167 



To Omar And lie who nursed and nurtured this high thought, 
Khayyam who loved and strove and hoped his little day, 

"Has vanished, and the wide world knows him not,— 
His hopes, his deeds, and name alike forgot. 

Another breath, the seeming solid earth 
Gone like a bubble — or an empty thought." 

Well, let him vanish when his work is done; 
The Form be melted and a new begun; 

Let the earth's self be shattered into bits 
That from the wreck may rise a fairer one. 

The Visible is fleeting as a breath, 
The Form is fragile and it perisheth ; 

Only [the Word, the mighty upward trend, 
The buoyant Pulse and Impulse, knows not death. 

From nebula to rounded worlds it ran; 

From clod it groped to monad, mollusk, man; 

And the first son of light, shall he first turn 
His face to darkness and deny the Plan ? — 



168 



Or shall he pluck the lily from the -weed To Omar 

And the green scum ? — a man, whom thought has freed ? ayyam 

On to the Deep and let the two be blent, 
The tides of Being and the living Deed, — 

Then, if we should be only shapes that seem — 
Our three-score-ten a momentary gleam 

On darkness — we have lived accordant lives, 
Nor made them broken dreams within a dream. 



A million moons shall wax and wane; 
Nor ends the Game: then boldly play, 
And if you lose or if you win, 
Stay on until the stars are wan 
And hills are purpling with the dawn, 
Then yield your place and go your way. 

You've played, rejoiced; there's naught to rue; 
The game goes on, nor ends with you. 



169 



THE CASTLE OF AUTREMEME 



I gan to this place aproche 

That stood upon so high a roche, 

Hyer stant ther noon in Spayne. 

House op Fame. 



THE CASTLE OF AUTREMEME 

Upon the height it gleameth far, 
At noon in white, at eve a star; 
But when the crimson sunset glows, 
In golden light it grows and grows 
Against the flaming clouds that are 
Resplendent for the perfect close. 

A VOICE resounded through the halls; 
It shook the panes and painted walls: 
"Go, seek the castle on the height 
That at the midnoon glittereth white, 
That gleams in gold when sunset falls, 
And shines an amber star at night." 

The summons heard Sir Tanelot; 
The echoes three he heeded not: 
"The way is long and dark the night; 

There findeth the castle no mortal wight 
Save who, forgetting, is forgot; 
It flitteth left, it flitteth right." 



173 



The Castle They saddled his steed right richly set 

of Autrememe with cloth of gold and barb of jet 

The knight in armor leaped thereon, 
(A red rose grew by the mounting-stone) 
He passed the looming parapet 
And rode into the setting sun. 

Behind him stretched his shadow grim; 

The far-off mountains beckoned him: 

Their slopes were smit with lengthened light 

Their summits glittered lambent white 

Of silver with a golden rim 

That dipped and dimmed and faded quite. 

But high aloft the castle stood: 

It dimmed not with the darkened wood, 

But gleamed in splendor lone and far 

Against the blue without a scar, 

Till hill and valley, field and flood 

Were blotted out, — then shone, a star. 

Then rose the blood-red moon behind; 
Afar and faintly wailed a wind. 
Nearer and nearer its moaning drew; 
174 



To spoken sounds and sobs it grew: The Castle 

"Who hears we loose, who hearkens we bind,"— °f Autrememe 
The castle light was hid from view. 

Upon the wind the voices sped, 
But giant Horrors rose instead. 
Their names and number who shall tell, 
Or where they fought or how they fell? 
His shield was dinted, his sword was red.... 
At length 'twas dawn, and all was well. 

And lo, there loomed the castle wall; 
The warder answered his bugle call. 
He passed the portal whereon was writ — 
But he read not the writing for all his wit. 
They led his wearied steed to stall, 
Yet naught was strange himseem£d it. 

Rich and rare yet naught was new: 
By the mounting-stone a red rose grew, 
But the skies above and the fields below, 
And the castle, were filled with a golden glow, 
For thus was the writing and the words were true, 
Though he read them not and could not know: 
175 



The Castle "This is the castle of Autrememe: 

of Autrememe It ig eyer the same and ig not the game 

Here, traveler, rest thee a day and a night, 

Then seek the castle glittering white " 

At sunset in a golden flame 
The turret gleamed upon the height. 



176 



NOTES 

Page 28 

In the first and second lines of this sonnet there is an unin- 
tentional echo from "Hyperion" — 

"I stood upon a shore, a pleasant shore." 

It seemed to me altogether better to let the lines stand with an 
explanation than to change them to avoid comment. 

Page 85 

In "Bartolome Ruiz" I do not pretend to the accuracy of 
a translation. It takes a resolute abnegation of self and a rare 
listening patience to reproduce in a foreign tongue both the solid 
substance and the volatile spirit of a poem. My fellow towns- 
man Mr. Edward R. Taylor has succeded so well in putting into 
English both the body and the spirit of the "Trophees" of Heredia 
of which the original of my sonnet is part, that I am glad to ex- 
press here my appreciation for his work. 

Page 144 

"Baron" Stiegel was a picturesque character of Revolutionary 
times, — a man of many activities and interests, somewhat eccen- 
tric, but with the good of his workmen and his community at 
heart. Among his benefactions is the gift of a plot of ground for a 
church at a rent of one red rose yearly, to be paid in the month 
of June whenever the donor or his heirs shall demand payment. 
The payment of the rose has in recent years been made the 
occasion for a celebration. 

In the ups and downs of the Revolution, Stiegel lost his 
property. He was imprisoned for debt and on his release sup- 
ported himself bravely by teaching the children of the men who 
had worked on his estates and at his furnaces. 

Page 161. 

It seems impossible that Omar Khayyam will always cover 
so much of the literary horizon as he has covered in recent 
years. His philosophy can not fit permanently a civilization in 
which the original stock of play-energy is so far from being spent 

177 



I'saj it is in the Germanic civilization, and that is so surely on 
the way to being pervaded by the good-will — by the simple, 
glad, childlike doing — implicit in Christianity. But, on the other 
hand, so long as the poignant spiritual unrest remains, Omar wil 
feed it; and, still more truly, so long as the tenseness brought 
about by modern social conditions remains, the large ease of Fitz- 
gerald's treatment and the long vibration of his verse will soothe 
and satisfy, and refutations of the Rubaiyat will be either high- 
pitched or they will be mathematically dull. Omar loses more 
through the multitude of imitations, parodies, and adaptations 
than through arguments and verses directed against him. 



A word upon the plan of the book may not be out of place. 
I have grouped the poems not so much to secure an artistic effect 
as to reveal what appears, however dimly, in all art work not 
hemmed in by theories, — an outline of life and a progressive 
criticism upon it. To be sure the outline is fragmentary and the 
criticism partial, for although the whole of life is musical, the 
gamut we run is kept narrow enough within the range of our ex- 
perience and intuition, and our time is not all given to the 
conscious making of music. Nor, laying aside these obvious 
limitations, have I tried to fit thought and feeling into inexorable 
categories. I have let the poems fall into some sort of order in 
an approximation to what seemed to me when they were written 
a just and central conception of a man's relation to his surround- 
ings, — arranging, as it were, a few details of the story of this 
wrestling match of ours in the dawn. In the sense of forming 
part of a plan, all of the work is dramatic, although that which 
is dramatic in a fuller sense also has a place, and even in work 
that is farthest from a full and concrete expression of truth, I trust 
there will not be entirely absent a distant murmur of what is 
more real than any poem. 

Finally, I do not mean by these hints of plan and purpose to 
disarm criticism on the poems. Each poem is set forth as a work 
of art, and as such it must stand or fall alone. 

San Francisco, April 21, 1902. C. B. 

178 



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JUN 11 1902 
1 COPY DEL, TO CAT. DIV. 
JUN. 12 1902 
JUN. 19 1902 



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